Sri Ganesa Maharishi was an ancient sage who lived during the Treta Yuga. His birth name was Ganesa and he was a small king, before being attaining the status of the divine sage.
King Ganesa ruled his kingdom in a nice manner. Once, there occurred a severe drought in his region, and due to that, his people suffered from severe poverty, and hence they began to gather in front of the palace of King Ganesa and explained about their problems. Due to that, the king began to donate as much food grains from his treasury, but it lasted only for a few months. One day, due to the grace of Lord Vinayaka, the great rishi Sri Narada had arrived to his palace, and due to his kind advice, he had started doing severe penance on Lord Vinayaka for a few months. In appreciation to his bhakti, Lord Vinayaka appeared in front of him and granted him a food pot, Amudasurabi, and also blessed him. Due to the blessing of Lord Vinayaka, the poverty in his kingdom was disappeared and his people were very happy and praised the king and Lord Vinayaka for the sudden good change.
In course of time, after attaining old age, King Ganesha was disinterested in worldly affairs, and hence he became a sage, and came to be known as “SRI GANESA MAHARISHI”. Once a newly married couple laughed at him and commented about his appearance, but the great Sri Ganesa Maharishi forgave their mistake, and he has asked them to worship Lord Vinayaka as their beloved deity. He has also granted the boon of becoming the holy tree ARASA MARAM, and after their life time, they have turned into Arasa tree, and still Lord Vinayaka dwell under the trees and people worships the holy trees also, while worshipping Lord Vinayaka.
Similar to sage Purushundi, Sri Ganesa has become a great sage. His penance had lasted for several years even without having proper food and water. He was such a great devotee of Lord Vinayaka. He had contained the powers equivalent to that of Lord Vinayaka, and is always inseparable from him. As per the boon given by Lord Vinayaka, he was able to get the divine vision of Lord Vinayaka, whenever he require!
From this incident, we should also have to cultivate more and more bhakti on the god, so that we could live peacefully in this earth, and also can finally attain the divine abode.
Let us worship the great sage Sri Ganesa Maharishi, and let us be blessed.
“OM SRI GANESA MAHARISHI NAMO NAMAHA”
WRITTEN BY
R.HARISHANKAR